Here's the place to hold the conversation about letters, sounds, and words websites and technologies. In what ways do the sites you reviewed support what you know about teaching letter names, letter... more

I found some really great links today. All of them off of Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. Their website is really awesome! I particularly had a grand time on the "Kids" site, which is broken down... more

After reviewing the sites for today's class I thought that students would really enjoy them. The students would be excited to be learning and playing at the same time. I think that these websites... more

Like everyone else, I also like the Teach Your Monster to Read and the BBC's Bitesize applications. The Bitesize website made me want to keep playing the games they had to offer. With this kind of... more

I bookmarked this site and introduced it to my son (who is five and starting Kindergarten this fall). He had an absolute blast on it! It was very user friendly and easy for him to do. He's never had... more

I had never used this site before but I have heard so much about it since we started this class. I've looked over it and realized it is a great resource. I have added it to my website and I can't... more

I'm glad you like it too. My son plays on it & that's it's great. Another good website for teachers & students is Big Universe. A principal & I have been speaking about it & he is going to try to get ... more

I had only vaguely heard of this website but after this class I feel like I am being directed to it through one of our readings or activities. I have found it to be full of great resources and I am... more

After reviewing the sites that were posted, many of them will be very useful in my classroom for individual or whole class instruction. I really enjoyed BBC's Bitesize and Teach Your Monster How to... more

Todays articles and websites got me to thinking about teaching spelling in my high school classroom. I teach vocabulary, but outside of commonly misspelled words. It's not something I or any teacher... more

I honestly think that once students hit upper elementary, spelling starts to go out the window and then it is gone by middle and high school. When I was in high school we were given frequently missed ... more

In my second grade classroom I use Words Their Way. I love the way it's broken down into sorts and you know exactly what sort to move the student to next. I give weekly spelling test on Friday's, and ... more

I also use Words Their Way in my class. It's very easy to manage and you know exactly where kids should be placed and where they need to move to. My students work with their sorts during reading... more

In my third semester at Appalachian our literacy instructor introduced us to the words their way sort. I believe this is a great resource to have for the students to use. I didnt see the value in the ... more

At my school we implemented Fundations about 6 years ago. Most of the teachers stopped using it. The kindergarten teachers now use Letter Land. First grade, however, decided to keep using Fundations. ... more

Morgan, I have never used Letter Land but I had a colleague bring in the program. It seems like an amazing program. Does your Kindergarten teachers like the program? Yes, I also find that Words Their ... more

hey Lindsay- The Kindergarten teachers love the program! I have actually been to the training and it was really cool. They said it was created for children that had severe learning disabilities and... more

Here are some introductions to LetterLand on YouTube if you want to watch. My daughter went through the program in Kindergarten, but our 1st grade doesn't use it. She picked up and remembered her... more

Lindsay, After going through Assessment and Correction and Clinic now, I am changing my spelling instruction completely. I will be using part of Words Their Way and ASU spelling sorts as well. I hope ... more

I think you can use WTW very similar to the ASU sorts. I think instead of using all the words that are suggested for WTW cut them down and switch them out like we do in clinic. I also like how the... more

Here is a link to a site focused for third grade, but can be used in 2nd or 4th. It has lots of great links for games for students. I use these when we can't go outside in the winter and they 'play'... more

In 3rd grade and up, there is much focus on character traits in literature. I use a word wall in the classroom with character trait words. We add a new one each day to a yearly journal. When one of... more

I really did think the website presented today were neat. I know as a kid I would have LOVED the Teach Your Monster to Read website. In this active high tech age, we needs games like this to support... more

I think these sites are great, especially for younger students. I was surprised that you use Word Girl in your classroom. I can see high schoolers having a better sense of humor over it than the... more

Yeah, I use picture books in my classroom but I have to be careful. My kids tune me out if I use Fancy Nancy or Llama Llama. However, just your regular run of the mill picture books like Cynthia... more

I have never taught grades in which I have to work on letters or sounds. I have worked on vowel sounds with students and words. The way I have always taught spelling is by using words their way. I do ... more

I felt like most of the sites were not beneficial to me since I teach fourth grade. Even my struggling readers do not want to be perceived as "babies". Not that those sites were baby sites but the... more

I think one thing that is hard about teaching the younger adolescent set (which I would consider 4th, 5th, 6th) is that some of them still need work with basic foundational skills although not an... more

I could definitely see how meeting the needs of those students could be difficult. Often when you try to meet their basic foundational skills the lessons do not match up with the maturity level of... more

I can relate to not being able to define a reading program. I feel that way at my school. There is no program, no guidance, we just follow the Reader's Workshop Model. I like the model because I can... more

Breanna, I am currently reading the different pieces of legislation throughout the years with relation to reading and reading programs and I am going to tell you I really do not see how schools get... more

I can feel you!! Up until a couple years ago it was just teach and go. We did reading work shop, and Phonics with Fountas and Pinnell. Now we use Imagine It. I like the phonics program with Imagine... more

Imagine it is a litearcy program that WSFCS adopted a couple of years ago. It is comprised of 3 components, red band (reading), green band (phonics) and blue band (writing). It is basically a program ... more

My mom teaches first grade in Forsyth County and is required to utilize Imagine It! I don't know much about it but that it's very time consuming. I would be LIVID if I was expected to teach a program ... more

I have heard a lot of negative things about Imagine It but I have not experienced it for myself. I like the idea of having something kind of mapped out but I wouldn't want to be told exactly what to... more

Breanna, I agree!! I like having the phonics part of it. It's good and mapped out sequentially and teaches phonics in an organized fashion, but I DON'T like the reading part of it. I wish I could... more

Imagine It! does do a good job of adding phonics into their program, however; all students don't all need the same word work practice at the same time. Some students may be on beginning sounds while... more

That makes sense! I find that is what's wrong with a lot of programs. They go at one rate. If you are not able to stray from it and provide the instruction to the students where their needs are then... more

Spelling and word study has changed so much since we were on school. At my school we use the Words Their Way spelling program to teach Spelling and Word Study. I have found that it is a great program ... more

I have also used spelling city.com in my classroom a lot. There is a link on my webpage. I like having the students type in their words and then use them in games. It gives them extra practice along... more

I liked how you pointed out that these websites might be used with ESL and ELL students. This was something that occurred to me while I was reading over them. I think these could be great ways to... more

Lindsay, I also use words their way. I have found to be very similar to the ASU word study that we have received. What I like most about the Words Their Way is that there are a lot of words that get... more

Breanna, I also thought that Words Their Way was similar to ASU clinic. However I like the way the Clinic taught us to assess their independence and perform spell checks. I think I put too much... more

I agree about the ASU and spell checks. I was previously moving my kids too quick through the patterns and I don't think it was helping them much. Spelling city sounds fun but I could see your mixed... more

My kids really struggle with letter sounds and words, so seeing all of these great websites will be so helpful!!! My school has a subscription for Successmaker. I really like it because what it does... more

Natalie, I am curious about Successmaker. I also use Words Their Way and it can be a struggle because there is sooooo much. Did you feel that Successmaker correlated well with WTW? Did you see growth ... more

Lindsay, I liked successmaker. I didn't find that it went well with WTW because it was based on where the students was in the program. I did see a little bit of growth. We only got it toward the end... more

I think I would have had more success with the program if I had had it earlier because I would have become more familiar with it myself. I didn't have much time to learn how the program worked and... more

This is an area where my inexperience really shows! Dr. K., I don't know if I'm totally sure exactly what your bias is? Do you not believe in teaching phonics directly? Is that correct? Either way, I ... more

I am glad we are on the same page with the word sorts provided by ASU...they are just wonderful! I don't know what I would do without them in my classroom! My assistant uses them for word study and I ... more

I was surprised to find out that Letter Land is a British program (happened across that information this past semester when I was reading my supervising teacher's curriculum). I think the only reason ... more

In my class we talk a lot about the etymologies of words and then also the history of the English language and how it came to exist in its present form. A lot of times I will help my students to... more

I think incorporating a word wall with technology could be an interesting concept. I found an article where a teacher used a wiki like our Re5533 wiki to create a word wall. See what she did here... more

The first grade team at my school uses Fundations as our word study program. I think it is great for on and below grade level students because it teaches the basics. I do think it is too easy for... more

Karie, did your students have spelling tests or spelling checks after they finished their sorts (before moving to next) when your assistant was teaching the sorts. I see the production as a way to... more

Yeah they had a spelling test. Some of the activities she did was have the kids sort the words, play concentration, write headers on dry erase boards and then she would call out the word and they had ... more

I have never heard of Fundations. How did you show your assistant how to do word sorts? It is great to have an extra person in the classroom if they are an extra help. If you have someone in the... more

First I explained how word sorts work and explained the different sounds in each sort. Then I had her watch as I sorted words with a group. The thing with word sorts is that you actually have to be... more

Ok, I imagined that's what tapping it out meant but I wasn't sure. Thanks. It's not effective when you have an assistant who isn't really engaged with the students. Maybe you'll have better luck this ... more

Yes it is a program that Yadkinville started before I began working there. I think it is K-3 because I student taught in 3rd grade and they had previously used it. All the other grades have stopped... more

Hey Natalie- I am at Karie's school too. Fundations is good, like Karie said, for your struggling readers. It is scripted. You read what is right on the page, and then supplement anything that you... more

Fundations is actually supposed to be whole group, but I usually give the spelling assessment that is at the end of the unit as a pre assessment. Then the students who do well the first time, I have... more

Fundations is meant to be whole group, I think. I'm not sure because technically I've never been trained on it. It was one of those "this is what we use and here's the manual" things when I started... more

Morgan, Thank you! I think that Fundations would be great to use during Guided Reading time in one of the rotations because then you can do fundations with your lower students, and words their way... more

I have thought about doing that but there's the constant reminder of time. In the beginning I read with students and tried to incorporate word sorts. It was terrible. I personally felt like I was... more

I used a couple of these sites in first grade when teaching phonics. I really like the construct a word because it uses word chunks and I taught alot of work chunks. In fourth grade, my PRT does word ... more

Heather, At our school this year we used a program called Reading Plus. Like your school some of the students made progress, but others were not able to progress and it created a lot of frustration.... more

In my opinion, this is one of those negative side-effects of high-stakes testing. So often we are handed a program that is "teacher proof" and told that we have to "teach" the program even though it... more

Skype is a cool tool for bringing authors and other experts into our classroom. A teacher I have partnered with has gotten a Jewish couple to Skype with her during her unit on the Holocaust. They're... more

Wow! What a great idea to Skype someone with a Jewish background while researching the Holocaust. Skype can be thought of as a FREE field trip/learning experience in the classroom! (with the budget... more

I can tell you are very excited by this study! I love your enthusiasm! It's great that your assistant works well with you and you two can stay on the same page with your students. It really helps to... more

You will love kindergarten. If my students are not working on guided reading with me or word study with my assistant, they are in literacy centers. Each student has a literacy center partner. With... more

It sounds like you have a lot of technology. I think that is great! I have a feeling I will love Kindergarten, but it will definitely be a change! I like that you have a lot of different things going ... more

They stay busy, actually (especially when they get the hang of things). The best advice I can give you: Don't underestimate the kinders. They are capable of so much more than you'd think. I teach... more

I use Spelling City at home for my daughter and have for about 3 years. I really like the many features that it has to offer as both a parent and an educator. I liked it so much in the beginning that ... more

Thanks for sharing Spelling City! It's a K-12 site, so I'm super excited to explore it for my high school classes. My students could really use some spelling practice. I think once they past middle... more

That is very true. I used Spelling City all the time when I taught 3rd grade. This past year when I was moved to 5th I did not really get to use it. I was put under the impression by some others at... more

Natalie, With spelling city you can add in your own spelling list each week and the kids can play games with the words, take test with the words, learn vocabulary with your word list, use the words... more

Kassy, I am so glad that your assistant has been trained with ASU sorts. Did you train her or was that something that your school did? I wish all of our assistants had that training! I would love to... more

She has been doing word sorts for several years now. Our reading specialist at our school trained all of our assistants on the early steps lesson plan -- word study, reading plans, and all that goes... more

Kassy I'm like you in that my assistant has been trained using ASU words sorts and in Words Their Way spelling. She was trained by our Title I teacher and she is great with the spelling center. She... more

It's funny, I teach upper grades and have for the entire 10 years that I've been teaching so I've never had an assistant. This year I had one for 30 minutes twice a week and I literally just stared... more

I think it's a great idea that your assistant is trained in ASU word sorts. This is very beneficial and you know that you can trust her to complete word sorts accurately. I love that you use many... more

Letterland is great. I use it to motivate kiddos who aren't already familiar with the alphabet. For those who do already "know" the alphabet, it helps them feel more comfortable with the sounds.... more